It was a tiny bit sad to leave that stunning place, but we progressed further north toward Swakopmund, through more dramatic scenery, rugged and unbelievably twisted and ancient rocks, so big, rearing up from the flat desert floor.
The Namibian roads are regularly graded dirt that do have the occasional corrugation, but are basically pretty good. Heaps better than the tarred roads in Madagascar. (It’s funny how I keep comparing things to Madagascar, that place was unique in every way.) The dust was the only problem, but that wasn’t too bad because there is very little traffic anyway.
We stopped at a lookout that was called ‘The Moon Mountains’ or something like that. Truly it did look like another planet, certainly nothing like an Earthly view. The whole place for multiple kilometres around was twisted and uplifted shale rocks that sparkled like something Liberace would wear. Gobsmacking.
We saw a large herd of springboks that kept criss-crossing the road and giving us multiple photo opportunities. Boing boing they go. Very pretty critters.
At Walvis Bay we saw flamingos just off shore on a sand bar. Click click.
Walvis Bay and Swakopmund are both beach towns built on the edge of the desert – a strange sight, especially for those houses on the back street, whose rear fences abut what looks like a million miles of sand dunes. Not a blade of grass to be seen in anyone’s ‘garden’ – just sand and paving…
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Our day began with the giant orange sand dunes of the Namib Desert. That area is perhaps one of the most beautiful and awe-inspiring places on the planet. So big, so clean, so awesome and so plurry hot! Walking over that soft, crumbling and sizzling hot sand was quite uncomfortable but definitely worth it. It is utter beauty on a grand scale. Smooth sweeping and sharply delineated lines of the dune ridges, curving in great arcs up to points as high as 350 metres above the flat desert floor. The view from the top of ‘Dune 45’ was just out of this world. Georgie explored around the base of the dune, electing not to battle the steep climb, and encountered a beautiful – and seldom seen – bustard as well as some interesting lizards and insects. Both of us felt that it was our new favourite place on the planet – if only it wasn’t so jolly hot!
In the afternoon we were taken to an interesting narrow gorge that had been cut into the hard desert floor millennia ago. Like all of Namibia, the geology was puzzlingly intriguing. The gorge walls held millions of water-worn rounded river stones that were embedded into a porous limestone base. In some sections of this winding channel the hard river stones were sheared off as though cut with a hammer and chisel, or snapped by glacial force. It was wonderfully weird. Goodness me that place is just so fascinating!
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The next day consisted of a very long, very hot drive through the ever-changing and gloriously surreal Namibian desert mountains. Wildlife was plentiful in this landscape that appeared to be so dry and barren that it couldn’t possibly support anything. But when we stopped for ‘bushy bushy’ (wee wee breaks) you could read the tracks and spore of many creatures in the dust.
The geology was so varied and puzzling, colours, textures and shapes that seemed truly unbelievable.
That night, under the shade of an enormous social weaver bird colony, Georgie and the rest of the crew saw a cape fox and a jackal who came into the campsite. Damn – I was in the shower and missed them both. The cape fox returned several times to drink from a pool under the campsite tap, but not whilst I was present.
Passing over the Namibian border wasn’t as hard as I expected. There were no armed guards or anyone intimidating, in fact the customs officer actually smiled.
We had started the day canoeing down the Gariep River, with South Africa one one side and Namibia on the other bank. It was a pleasant, although fairly strenuous paddle, from which we emerged tired but satisfied. We had seen some interesting birds along the way, including a pied kingfisher and a sea eagle, plus lots of cormorants.
Then it was a drive over the border and into the wilds of Namibia. It is such a ruggedly beautiful country, dry as chips but also grand and impressive. Fences are not so common so wildlife was far more plentiful. We saw oryx, springbok, mountain zebra, ostrich, a lone warthog, goliath heron, huge social weaver bird nests the size of thatched huts, and a magnificent sun ‘spider’, which is not actually a spider.
The enormous Fish River Canyon was breathtaking on sunset. It is reputed to be the second biggest canyon after the Grand Canyon. It is massive, an utterly spectacular and awe-inspiring sight, and geologically fascinating – and is Georgie’s new favourite place in the world. Photographs just cannot do this incredible canyon justice – but the memory of it will be forever imprinted on our minds.
Large scorpion burrows were common in our campsite but unfortunately we never managed to slap eyes on one of the beasties.
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We had a bloody early start and drove further north through increasingly dry and stark, but incredibly beautiful mountainous country. Sharp eyed Georgie spotted some springboks on the side of the road.
Eventually, as we neared the Namibian border the mountains took on an other-worldly look. Harsh, dry, rocky with incredible shapes and shadows cast across rugged scree slopes and layered cliffs. Many a photo was taken from out of the bus window.
We were fascinated by what appeared to be ancient branched aloe trees scattered amongst the lower shrubs, some about two metres tall. Our guide, Johnny, described them as quiver trees, each about 100 years old he said.
We arrived at the Gariep (Orange) River and camped amongst more vineyards. The views across the wide river were of the dry Mars-scape mountains of Namibia. Our anticipation for reaching that strange and unique place steadily grew.
It was at that campsite that I saw my very first fifty trillion dollar note! A real one! Mind you, it was Zimbabwean dollars so it was probably only worth about 20 cents.
After a less than private night in a backpacker dorm in Cape Town we (all 13 of us) were taken on a ‘Tour of a Township’. This consisted of being driven to a ramshackle slum settlement, walked down the street (poverty porn) and shown memorials of people killed in the struggle against apartheid.
Then we were taken to a local pub, a smoke blackened shanty where the beer is brewed in big open drums and scooped out into large billy-like tins to be passed around and shared. Granted I have made homebrews that tasted worse – but I threw that muck out! Despite the complete lack of anything that might be described as sanitary I did risk my digestive tract’s equilibrium and took a sip. The next morning I paid for it. Georgie pretended to sip and smiled politely – she clearly has more sense than me!
After the smoke stained, claustrophobic dimness of that shanty we were then taken to a kind of undercover beer garden where you had to first walk down the clamorous street to buy your stubbies then walk back to where the DJ played the music so loud that two of our group put ear plugs in, and the rest of us just gave up hearing anything anyone said. Then some big plates of meat and sausages were plonked on our table. Using our fingers we all tried some. Yaarrggh! Chilli! Nursing my poor bruised taste buds I opted to drink beer instead. Georgie, however, ate two pieces of somewhat undercooked, chilli soaked chicken, and paid for it later.
After that ordeal we piled into our real tour bus (truck) and set off on our real adventure. We drove through stark, dry country, passing numerous vineyards until we stopped at one very scenic farm, set up camp and settled into a wine tasting. After which I managed to manoeuver a somewhat tiddly Georgie – who is unused to drinkling – back to the camp where we were fed a huge meal. I poured a still giggling Georgie into her sleeping bag and turned off the light.
We are about to embark on an overland journey through Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi, Tanzania and eventually Kenya.
As we will be camping for much of it we do not know when we will have access to the internet for blogging.
If it is anything like Madagascar (although NOTHING is like Madagascar) it may be some time before we do our next post.
The past two days in Cape Town have been spent looking at gardens and getting caught in traffic. Even though the roads are very good here the traffic is phenomenal.
The very beautiful botanic gardens we found fascinating, but unfortunately it was very cold, wet and drizzly for the time we wandered around with our fingertips and toes going numb. We could have spent an entire day there looking at all those strange plants, but survival was imperative so we retreated to the dryness and warmth of the car after only about an hour.
Now comes possibly the least comfortable part of our adventure, and potentially the most exciting.
Now, as a spoilt bleedin’ Aussie I don’t like queues (even the spelling is weird), so when I saw the interminably long lines of people waiting to purchase tickets so that they could join the even longer queue for the cable car to ascend the admittedly impressive Table Mt, I got into a bit of a sulk.
To her credit the long-suffering Georgie convinced me to stick it out, and by golly I’m glad she did!
Table Mt is stunning. Even with all those other people there. The ecology on that misty, rocky, wind-blown, 1000 metre tall monolith is utterly unique. The plants, lizards and mammals that live there are fascinating and fabulous. The views too are incredibly impressive, out over the coast line and to the mountain ranges in the misty distance. We were lucky because we struck a day when the mountain’s ‘table cloth’ was not there and we could see for ever in a 360 degree view. Mind-blowing is probably an apt description.
I will let the pictures say what I couldn’t possibly put into words:
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Day 2
After the splendours of Table Mt one might think that all else would be just ho hum, but no, today’s adventure managed to continue the magnificence of yesterday.
In our hire car we drove slowly down the spectacular coast road that leads to the Cape of Good Hope. The road is an engineering wonder that is cut into the high rocky cliffs that plummet down into the blue waters of the Atlantic Ocean. Awe-inspiring views were around nearly every corner and we stopped whenever there was a space big enough for our titchy hire car to pull off so we could take photos.
The day was full of fabulous protea scrubland and impressive cliffs reaching into the sea. Wildflowers of weird and wonderful shapes abounded, and we even got up close to a family of baboons (windows closed of course) that had a few cutsie little bubbies.
The Cape of Good Hope was pretty busy, tourist-wise, but not nearly as jam packed as the Twelve Apostles was in Australia.
Later in the day we came to a coastal stretch that is a protected reserve for the unique South African Penguin, where hundreds of the little critters were busy nesting, feeding chicks, braying in their funny way and just sunning themselves on the beach.
A lovely day in all.
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Day 3
We continued down the coast road, marvelling at the dramatic rocky coast line, stopping regularly for photo opportunities.
At Betty’s Bay we called in on another penguin reserve, paid our 20 Rand ($2) and wandered around looking at not only the nesting penguins but the lizards, birds and dassies too. We tootled down the road further to find a nice spot to bung together a sanger. Sure enough we found a botanical gardens that we figured might have a shady bench somewhere.
Well, we were pleasantly surprised to discover that the gardens were a fabulous creation, chock-a-block full of interesting native plants and set out in separate wetland, woodland and fynbos areas as well as other SW Cape ecological biospheres. We spent a very long time wandering from one plant to another, oohing and aahing. Then we discovered that there were trails that led up into the valley behind and even a very enticing 4 hour circuit walk up into the rugged mountain behind.
As it was getting a bit late in the arvo we decided to find a place locally to sleep the night and come back again in the morning. We found a nice B&B and I took myself off for a bit of a wander up ‘Rod’s Trail’ (yes, that’s what its called) into the hills behind. The flowers up there nearly blew my mind, proteas the size of bread plates and all different shapes and colours. Then a long tailed Cape Sugar Bird posed for me, its tail three times its body length. Beautiful.
I wondered what the next day’s adventure would bring me as I walked up the tall dry mountain, the home of leopards, baboons and boks of all descriptions.
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Day 4
I don’t get it. How can it just keep getting better?
My walk up to Leopard’s Kloof Waterfall was utterly splendid. The fynbos at Betty’s Bay kept surprising me every few metres with yet another weird and wonderful wildflower. I thought Western Australia’s wildflowers look like they come from another planet, well South Africa’s wildflowers look like they come from another UNIVERSE! The diversity of proteas themselves was enough to blow me away, varying from tiny little things to enormous great flowers, and all the other plants of different shapes and forms, including terrestrial orchids, were totally amazing. I loved it.
Georgie declined to undertake the rather strenuous uphill clamber, and instead spent a few hours in utter peace and tranquility in the gardens whilst I explored the mountainside.
Georgie wants to move to Betty’s Bay, but I’d have to learn Africaans to work in the schools, and we’d probably never get work permits anyway.
But all good things must come to an end, and by midday we had pushed on further along the coast. The quality of the scenery took a bit of a dip, although the glorious dry and rocky mountains continued to hug the horizon. We turned inland and came into wine country that looked to be in the grip of a drought, everything was deathly dry and brown, and there were signs heralding that the dams were down to only 17%.
My eyes began to get tired so we stopped in a dusty little town and sought out what might have been its only cafe for a shot of caffeine. The lady serving provided us each with a huge slab of orange cake that was simply oozing with syrup and juice and was utterly delicious.
We then progressed on to Stellenbosch, a rather pretty tree lined town with lovely architecture that is in the heart of South Africa’s premier plonk growing district. We managed to wangle an utterly sumptuous room in a rather palatial guest house for a price that was only just outside our budget. All rather posh really.
We planned to explore the botanical gardens that were just across the road the very next morning.
